Child porn charge in Eagleswood based on old magazine found in house fire

~Jennifer - posted on 01/19/2012
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EAGLESWOOD — The discovery of a single, old magazine from the 1970s with images of juvenile females led State Police to lodge a charge of endangering the welfare of children against the architect whose West Creek home burned Tuesday.

The magazine fell from a ceiling along with other papers as firefighters pulled down wallboard in their attempts to reach the flames, said Trooper Christopher Kay, a State Police spokesman.

Because of the limited number and age of the images, State Police charged Gamal El-Zoghby, 75, with a fourth-degree offense, which can be dealt with in municipal court, Kay said.

El-Zoghby was released on his own recognizance Tuesday night after being interviewed and arrested at the State Police station in Tuckerton on Route 9.

El-Zoghby, a well-known New York City architect and professor at the Pratt Institute, built his landmark home at the end of Dock Road in the late 1990s.

A fire erupted shortly before noon Tuesday when the house was unoccupied, and firefighters were on the scene for 12 hours making certain the flames were fully extinguished in the structure’s walls, made of plywood, fiberglass, resin and steel laminates.

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Unless he admits they were his, it seems ridiculous to me. I tend to agree with Krista -- trades people certainly could have left it, either as a joke or as an insult. I know my family bought a house owned by the builder of the subdivision. We did some work on the home (removing wallpaper) and needed to remove a very large mirror on the wall in the master bath to remove all the paper. When the mirror was removed and the paper stripped out the wall, we discovered a whole range of colorful (to say the least) comments left on the wall under the mirror and the paper (so basically, the messages were right in your face when you were staring at the mirror, you just couldn't see them). They were statements like, "Mr. ____, you are a F@!@ A%*#@(%(", etc. I could completely see there being a reasonable explanation like that for those magazines as well.

What is the definition of juvenille - are we talking teenage or toddler?

Was it a porn mag or naturists weekly? Surely it depends on the context of the photos.

How serious is a 4th degree offence?

Don't quite see that a builder would take a 20 - 30 year old magazine to work and accidentally leave it in the wall.

In theory if there was just 1 magazine and nothing on his computer, no complaints by friends, family or students regarding inappropriate behaviour towards children then possibly no charges but I suspect they found the pics and can't be seen to be taking no action or others with more serious images will claim the same defence.